Google pledged another $800 million for small to midsized businesses (SMBs), health care workers, and governments as they struggle to slow the spread of COVID-19 and keep their doors open as the disease continues to wreak havoc on the economy.
In a blog post, Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai detailed how this latest commitment breaks down. It includes $340 million in Google Ads credits available to SMBs with active accounts over the past year. According to Pichai, credit notifications will appear in their Google Ads accounts and can be used across Google’s advertising platforms at any point until the end of 2020.
The latest COVID-19 support also includes $250 million in ad grants to the World Health Organization (WHO) and government agencies that provide information on how to prevent the coronavirus plus an additional $20 million in ad grants to community financial organizations and NGOs specifically to run public service announcements about SMB relief funds and resources.
Additionally Google will invest $200 million in a fund to support NGOs and financial institutions around the world that provide small businesses with access to capital. “As one example, we’re working with the Opportunity Finance Network in the U.S. to help fill gaps in financing for people and communities underserved by mainstream financial institutions,” Pichai wrote.
Google’s Goal: 2M to 3M More Face MasksIt’s also allocating $20 million in Google Cloud research credits for academic institutions and researchers using Google cloud computing and infrastructure to study potential therapies and vaccines, track data, and identify ways to combat COVID-19.
Finally, Pichai said Google will provide “direct financial support and expertise” to boost personal protective equipment and medical devices. While this initiative doesn’t have a price tag attached, Google is “working with our longtime supplier and partner Magid Glove & Safety, with the goal of ramping up production of 2-3 million face masks in the coming weeks that will be provided to the CDC Foundation.”
Meanwhile, employees from across Alphabet’s companies — this includes Google, life sciences research organization Verily, and its secretive research and development arm X — “are bringing engineering, supply chain and healthcare expertise to facilitate increased production of ventilators, working with equipment manufacturers, distributors and the government in this effort,” Pichai wrote.
Google also upped its gift match that it offers employees from $7,500 annually to $10,000 annually in addition to the $50 million that Google.org already donated.
Cloud Giants Donate Millions to Fight COVID-19The cloud giant’s latest $800 million follows several hundreds of millions of dollars that Google and competitors Amazon and Microsoft have committed over the past month to fight COVID-19. Specific to Google, this includes a website with COVID-19 education, prevention information, and local resources; Google tools to help businesses and schools work remotely; and Verily’s COVID-19 testing program in the San Francisco Bay area.
Additionally, in partnership with Microsoft and Rescale, Google donated cloud computing resources to scientists and researchers working on test kits and vaccines for COVID-19. The new program called Tech Against Covid allows researchers to run simulations in the cloud without setup time or IT teams using Rescale’s platform combined with Google Cloud Platform and Microsoft Azure cloud computing resources. Running these massive workloads in the cloud means that researchers don’t need an on-premises supercomputer. Plus, they can contribute and share data from anywhere across the globe.
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